The Art of Keeping Faith Read online

  It’s time for us to have our girly break-down of the evening before. This is good. I can’t remember a damn thing. “How you feeling?” I ask after she has been lying next to me for five minutes without saying a word.

  “Like I’m going to die,” she groans, snuggling herself further under my duvet.

  “That bad, huh?”

  “Worse than bad! Why aren’t you suffering? You were completely out of control last night.”

  “I think I’ve slept it off. Wait a minute what do you mean, completely out of control?”

  “Well, what can you remember?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You don’t remember trying to eat Ben alive when you realised he was actually there and it wasn’t one of your weird dreams.”

  “I did not!”

  “You did! It’s a miracle you were not arrested.”

  “Shut up. I did not.”

  “Did too.”

  “Did not.”

  “Did too.”

  “Meredith for Christ’s sake, what did I do then?”

  “You knocked back six tequila’s in a row to celebrate Ben being home.”

  “Yeah I could taste that this morning,” I tell her. She scrunches her face in disgust.

  “Yes, but can you remember you nearly threw up all over the bar when the sixth went down?”

  Crap.

  “Ben had to pick you up and carry you outside before you threw up everywhere.”

  Crap.

  “Did I throw up?”

  “Yep.”

  “Shit.”

  Not the best start to the year. Again.

  “Oh, well. If that’s all then it’s not too bad.”

  “I haven’t got to angry Lilah, yet!”

  ”Shit.” I yank the duvet over my head in the hope it will all go away. It doesn’t deter Meredith who pops her head underneath.

  “You started on the band.”

  This gets the duvet pulled down quick. “What bloody band? I have no recollection of these events at all.”

  “Duh, you know, Ben’s band. They were all there and you started laying into them because apparently they have taken your Ben away.”

  Crap.

  “Oh, good grief. I’m surprised Ben is talking to me.”

  “From the sounds of this morning you haven’t been doing much talking.”

  I giggle like a teenager in response.

  “What was the band doing there anyway?” I ask.

  “I don’t know, everyone was very cagey. Although Jayne was not complaining; she was thrilled to see Dave again.”

  Jayne, our good friend from Halls of Residence last year, does love to chase boys. Dave, the Sound Box drummer and Ben’s oldest friend, was first on her hit list last year, when that failed she turned her attention to the football team—all of them.

  “So anyway, you sang,” Meredith says after a few moments of silence.

  “Shit, I did not!”

  “You did.”

  “What?”

  “Taylor.”

  “Shit.”

  “I think it was supposed to be “22.”

  “Shit, what do you mean supposed to be?”

  “You only knew one word.”

  “Shit, what was that?”

  “Twenty two.”

  “Shit.”

  Meredith starts to giggle uncontrollably and I am just about to smother her with a pillow when the front door slams and we hear Ben taking his shoes off.

  “Lilah, come and help unpack,” Ben shouts from the hallway.

  Ah, short-term domestic bliss, how sweet it is. I gleefully jump out of bed and dash down to help. I have never shown such enthusiasm for unpacking the shopping before.

  11.30 p.m.

  Aaaagh! It’s eleven-thirty, I have not prepared for tomorrow at all and have instead spent the evening listening to Ben play guitar while drinking wine with my brother and bestie.

  God damn it, I have just realised I have not even got my Uni Rules written down.

  Yet another shaky start to the academic year.

  The good news is Ben will be gone tomorrow so I can concentrate on my studies.

  The bad news is that Ben will be gone tomorrow.

  16th September

  Yay, first day of term.

  I just wish I could remember what my first lecture is? I was a bit preoccupied in June when I ticked all the boxes and now I cannot for the life of me remember what modules I chose.

  “It’s The Crusades,” Ben says. He is buttering bread as I pass it to him. Nothing crusade-like about that.

  “What’s a crusade?”

  “No, your first lecture is The Crusades.”

  I look at him in confusion, I think it is a little unfair that he always knows what I am thinking when I don’t have a clue what he is. “Are you sure? That sounds frightfully boring.”

  “Yep, I think you went ‘eenie meanie minie mo.’”

  “That would explain it then.”

  Ben is making me a bacon buttie, his specialty. I am trying to ignore the desperate sinking feeling I have in my stomach. When I get back from campus this afternoon he will be gone and I will be back to a life of Cheerios for one. “Extra ketchup, please.”

  “As always.” He flashes me his wicked smirk and the blues glint in the light from the open kitchen door.

  “Have you packed all your stuff?” I shove a spare piece of bacon in my mouth to distract myself from launching off the kitchen counter and begging him on my hands and knees to stay and cook me bacon every morning.

  “Yeah nearly, I will come back and get it after I drop you off.”

  “How you going to drop me off?”

  “In our car of course.”

  Ah. The car.

  “Um, Deathtrap Cooper is not very well at the moment.”

  “What? What do you mean not well?”

  “Um, the engine blew up.”

  “What, how did you do that?”

  “I don’t know, I was just driving her into town, and the next thing I knew there was smoke coming out of the engine.”

  “Shit, that’s bad.”

  “Yeah it was, they had to call the fire brigade.”

  Deathtrap Cooper is our banged up faded aubergine Mini Cooper. Deathtrap started off last year as mine but soon became ‘ours’ as did most things. Now it is just rusting outside while I decide what to do with it. There is no way I can afford a new car.

  “I will get it fixed,” Ben states firmly.

  “I am not sure it is worth it.”

  “It’s worth it and we are keeping it.”

  Blimey.

  “Okay, I will try to get it fixed by the next time you’re home,” I shrug.

  Whenever that will be, I add in my head.

  Stop it. Stop it.

  “So not then.” He chuckles as he kisses the sensitive spot under my ear and goose bumps spread down my left arm.

  “Nah, probably not. Now stop talking about the car, we have only got an hour left together.”

  9.20 a.m.

  We walk to campus in the end. This is new, commuting to campus. Last year we lived in Halls of Residence and just had to wake up and roll out of bed and into class.

  It’s Ben’s idea to walk, not mine. It’s not that far, and it is rather romantic as we stroll along in the late summer sunshine holding hands. On campus the first people we bump into are Jayne and Beth. Jayne dashes over to see us, jumping up and down in excitement at the prospect of the start of term. Beth, ex-Goth chick and one of my best friends, is not all that when it comes to tact. She is as subtle as a sledgehammer and notices my arms wrapped tight around Ben’s waist and asks, “All ready for the big good-bye, Lilah?”

  I offer her a grimace in return.

  “Yeah.”

  “Liar.”

  “Whatever.”

  “You all right, Lilah?” Ben tightens his own arms around me and I take a deep breath of his unique fabric softener and smoke scent.

  I am not
all right at all. I feel like I can’t breathe, which is becoming a regular occurrence, but I know I can’t keep doing this every time he comes and goes. I put a brave face on it and send a big smile his way. “Come on then, I may as well get this over with.” I say. He probably thinks I mean the lecture but what I really mean is the good-bye.

  We walk in silence together, our step in time as we head to our final destination. At the door I stop and look into the blues. “Guess this is it then?” I shrug. My chest is now completely constricted and it’s a miracle I am not purple and horizontal on the pavement.

  “Least I can do is walk you to the lecture door?” He shoots me a wink.

  “Uh, okay.”

  His thumb rubs circles in my palm as we walk up the stairs. Outside the door I stop again, ready to say the words.

  “I think I should make sure you safely sit in your seat.” He smirks a little but I can think of nothing to smirk about.

  “Uh, okay.” Clearly I left my advanced elocution at home this morning.

  Walking into the lecture room he heads to the chair that I sat in last year. I follow with feet full of lead.

  Pulling out my chair, he announces, “Your seat, Madame,” with a flourish of his hand.

  “Thanks,” I mutter, completely unable to put any words together at all.

  Ben leans down and kisses me on the lips. “I love you, Lilah McCannon.”

  “I love you, Ben. I’ll speak to you soon, hey?”

  “Yeah you will, Lilah.”

  Then, just like that, he turns and sits in the chair behind mine. His seat, the one he occupied last year regardless of whether we were talking to each other.

  “What are you doing?” I spin in my chair and hiss.

  “Getting ready for my lecture.” He grins his rock star smirk at me and pulls a Biro out of his back pocket. “Got my pen!” The grin widens even more. “Could I borrow some paper?”

  “No, seriously, Ben. What are you doing?”

  “Getting ready for the first lecture of the year, which is The Crusades, all because you randomly put your finger on that box and ticked it last year.”

  I have no idea what to say.

  “So you’re staying,” I finally manage.

  “That okay with you?”

  “But what about the band and the album?”

  “Well,” he starts, but at that moment the lecturer walks in.

  “Right then, people.” He claps his hands with a surprisingly loud bang. “It’s the second year, the time for dossing and drinking is over. Let’s knuckle down and get some good results.”

  Shit.

  17th September

  I have a boyfriend! Like a real one that lives with me.

  NOT in a separate room situation of the previous year but actually with me in my flat. The Boyfriend, otherwise known as Hot Stuff Ben, broached the subject with me yesterday. I would have written about it at the time but I was far too busy having ‘my boyfriend’s staying in the country sex. This was closely followed by ‘my boyfriend’s going to live with me’ sex.

  Yesterday we were walking across the campus lawn and I was conducting an internal debate between a trip to the library or a trip to our willow tree by the lake for a snog, when Ben reached into his bag and pulled out a CD. “For you,” he said.

  I stopped and stared at the Sound Box CD in my hand. Ben was on the front. My Ben is on the front of a CD! I greeted this news by running across the grass screaming my head off.

  Once he caught up with me he explained they had finished the album and were going to be promoting it but after three months of absence he had managed to finally wrangle being home with me. Just where he wanted to be.

  I was about to start running off across the grass again when he caught my hand and pulled me in toward him, blues flashing, and asked if I fancied having a live-in boyfriend.

  I said ‘yes’ obviously. Well, duh, of course I said bloody yes.

  Perfect! We are going to live in domestic bliss together forever.

  18th September

  I have just hauled ten sodding books all the way back from campus by bloody foot. Ten books, and not of a Mills and Boon’s paperback variety. Ten very heavy and undoubtedly boring history books that I am determined to read.

  The new lecturer is scary to say the least!

  Last year we had an assortment of lecturers; the best and funniest by far being crazy Professor Johnson. This year, he is still busy making all the new Freshers feel cosy and loved and we have ramped it up a notch with a mean-looking lecturer called Professor Pritchard. I can categorically report that he does not jump off tables or chairs to try to keep us awake or entertained. I can also categorically report that he does not like me at all. Already.

  It was silly really, but I was swinging my chair onto its two back legs to get closer to Ben, sitting at the desk behind me, when I lost my balance and fell backwards landing on my arse.

  Everyone thought it was hysterical, apart from Pritchard who looked like he was munching soap.

  Peering at me from over the rim of his glasses, he watched as I scrambled back up off the floor.

  “Ah, Delilah McCannon. I have heard about you. I think you can come and sit up here at the front with me.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Come on, up the front where I can make sure you are not swinging like you are at the park, or writing notes to your friend or flirting with your boyfriend.”

  What on earth has Johnson been telling him?

  “And can I just say to all my students that hangovers are not allowed on my time. That is what the weekends are for.”

  Professor Prick watched as I bundled up my stuff and shuffled to the chair he was holding out for me. I had the major hump until I realised that my new place gave me a beeline view of Ben. Ha! Stick that, Pratty Pritchard, I will just study Ben instead! Ben was well aware of my change in focus and smirked away to himself pretending to ignore me.

  After class, as everyone else filtered out, Meredith came storming up to Professor Pritchard, “Sir, really, can’t Lilah sit with me, we actually do some really good work together?”

  I am not sure this is strictly true but I nodded encouragingly.

  He looked down his list of student names. “Meredith Gilbert, also one to watch I believe.”

  Meredith made some strange squeaking noise like a mouse on speed and dashed out of the room leaving me alone with Professor Prick.

  “So Delilah, there will be no hangovers, no snogging, no dramas and just good old fashioned studying.”

  “Uh, yeah, I guess.”

  “You need to read the first three chapters of the core text by next week.”

  “Um, sure. No worries.”

  “I will be checking, Delilah. I am much harder to please than some of my colleagues and you will find that touchy feely pieces based on very few actual facts will not sit well with me.”

  What? I actually have to know facts now?

  I didn’t stop to ask, I just ran out of there as quick as Meredith but without the bizarre squeaking.

  19th September

  “What’s your book about?” I ask.

  We are sitting on ‘our’ bed, at least twenty-five books spread between us. I am trying to understand what caused the first crusade—what was the pivotal moment, or some shit like that. I’ve been staring at the same page for thirty minutes, trying to grasp that once there were two Popes. Who would have thought it? I am unclear of the details but Pope Urban the something-or-other seems like a complete head case.

  “To be honest, Lilah, I have no idea. Your right breast is slightly exposed so I have been concentrating on that for about forty minutes.”

  “Well why the hell didn’t you say?” I mock frown as I start to push all the heavy books off the bed and onto the floor.

  I don’t get time to finish my bed clearing; Ben catches hold of me by the ankles and pulls me down the bed toward him, which makes me give a girly screech of surprise.